In the wake of Hurricane Harvey, several food pantries in Plano traveled to East Texas to help residents in need. But as these organizations serve meals to coastal residents, locals at home are feeling the impact. Residents who depend on Minnie’s Food Pantry for their daily meals are noticing less food to feed their families. And in order for Minnie’s to continue their dual service, they’re looking for local community support to keep them going.
“The only thing that we have on our shelves in excess is green beens. Everything else has really been taken off our shelves,” said Cheryl “Action” Jackson, founder of Minnie’s Food Pantry.
“We’ve made about seven trips to the Houston area – two per week – sometimes taking two 24-foot trucks. It’s been an honor to serve our neighbors, but it wasn’t put in our budget to do so.”
Jackson said she was called to serve residents in the outlier communities surrounding Houston since many of these smaller communities were overlooked or under-served by disaster relief organizations. And many are in need of meals.
“We started calling it ‘Boots on the Ground,’ and we literally went into those areas and let them cry on our shoulders and feed them. We’ve had a phenomenal response, but it’s hurt us,” she said.
Each month, Minnie’s Food Pantry serves about 1,500 families and about 5,000 Collin County residents. They see between 100-150 families a day, and the shortage has forced Minnie’s to ration its donations to local families. Instead of 20-25 canned goods, families can only receive 11 cans in a box. And local families have begun asking Jackson, “Will you be able to serve us, too?” she said.
The pantry is lacking in staple pantry items like spaghetti and sauce, soups, rice, beans, peanut butter and jelly. And Jackson is calling residents to help support the pantry. She also requested the city government send community support to organizations in Plano, instead of those outside the city.
“We see the mayor doing this big, huge peanut butter drive for the North Texas Food Bank, but we’re in Plano. ... Why aren’t you asking the Plano food pantries, ‘What do you need?’” she said. “While you’re doing a drive and giving it to Dallas, we’re in your city feeding your families.”
The North Texas Food bank often collects food, which is shared in food banks in Collin County, but as a smaller locally based organization, Jackson said they’ve felt the squeeze of serving two communities.
Minnie’s has 734 families currently signed up for Thanksgiving meals, and with Christmas on the horizon, she said they won’t be able to serve both Houston and Collin County families for much longer.
“Within the next two weeks, we will have to shut down Houston,” she said. “We won’t be able, with the budget that we have, to do both. I can tell you that. We can’t do both anymore. And there’s going to be a lot of crying individuals and a lot of families that are in need, that wait on our truck.”
The city of Wallaceville, about 40 miles east of Houston, is situated between several rivers and lakes, and it’s very close to Trinity Bay. Of the 140,000 residents in the city, about 40 percent lost everything in the storm, Jackson said. Some families are still living in their mildewed homes because they have nowhere else to go, and residents of all ages have come to expect a meal from Minnie’s.
Still, she said, Plano has always answered the call when others are in need.
“What I know to be true is when it’s brought to their attention, they rise up. And that’s what I’m asking, that they rise up and they help us help our neighbors. They’ve always done it,” Jackson said.
